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• New Delhi will ‘keep Indus Waters Treaty in abeyance until Pakistan credibly and irrevocably abjures support for cross-border terrorism,’ says Foreign Ministry

ANKARA 

India said Tuesday that any issue related to Jammu and Kashmir is a bilateral matter with Pakistan, after US President Donald Trump said he would work with the two South Asian neighbors on the decades-long dispute.

It is a "long-standing national position," Indian Foreign Ministry spokesman Randhir Jaiswal told a news conference.

"That stated policy has not changed. The outstanding matter is the vacation of illegally occupied Indian territory by Pakistan," Jaiswal said when asked about Trump’s statement.

The US president said after he announced the ceasefire deal that he would "work with you both to see if, after a 'thousand years,' a solution can be arrived at concerning Kashmir."

Pakistan welcomed Trump's statement, which came on the heels of a US-mediated ceasefire on Saturday after days of heightened military tensions with missiles and drones fired across the borders of India and Pakistan.

Tensions rocketed between the two following an attack by unidentified gunmen which left 26 people dead, mostly Indian tourists, on April 22 in Indian-administered Kashmir.

New Delhi blamed Islamabad, which denied any role but proposed an impartial probe.

Soon after, the two sides took several reciprocal diplomatic measures, including the unilateral suspension by New Delhi of the Indus Waters Treaty, a decades-long water-sharing pact.

"India will keep the Indus Waters treaty in abeyance until Pakistan credibly and irrevocably abjures its support for cross-border terrorism," said Jaiswal.

Islamabad warned that any attempt to divert or stop water would be deemed an "act of war."

Separately, India on Tuesday declared a Pakistani official working at the Pakistan High Commission in New Delhi persona non grata for "indulging in activities not in keeping with his official status in India.”

In a tit-for-tat move, Pakistan also declared an Indian official with its high commission in Islamabad persona non grata for engaging in activities "incompatible with his privileged status."

*Aamir Latif in Karachi contributed to this report